Can Obama broker compromise?

The metaphor “fiscal cliff” gives the powerful visual that unless tax increases and spending cuts scheduled for January of next year are avoided, we all go “over the cliff” and to our doom. Doom in this case is another recession and the pain thus induced. Metaphors can make powerful prose and they can also misguide and hamstring thinking. You would think avoiding a recession is critically important and the only thing that matters.

Recessions have been around for hundreds of years and, like a leech, a recession sucks the poison out of a market full of excesses and makes it right and healthy again for future real growth. What is bad about that?

Don't use the “fiscal cliff” as an excuse to avoid taking the pain now. The widespread use of “fiscal cliff” obfuscates a far more meaningful metaphor, the “tsunami of debt,” that should be at the heart of our current discussions.

Richie Locasso

Huntington Beach

I don't understand why we are told that this country is looking at the precipice of the fiscal cliff and economic disaster. Didn't we just reelect a president who told us that his plans were working and that he was working 24-7 to solve the financial crisis? Didn't he just have four years of working to solve all our problems?

I guess we weren't informed that the president's fiscal plan, his budget, which he told us makes sense, has never received a single vote and that unemployment just jumped once more beyond expected numbers.

But no worry, we can all look forward to the magnificent inaugural galas when he gets sworn in for a second term, and those still hurting from the devastation of Hurricane Sandy can enjoy his gala on television, if they get their power back in time.

Barry Levy

Hawthorne

Retirement deferred

The original thrust of the Proposition 13 campaign was to not let the state throw grandma out of her home because she couldn't afford to pay the ever-increasing property taxes. I'm beginning to feel a lot like grandma.

My IRA tanked about 40 percent after the financial crisis and at my age I'll never be able to recover that loss. My retirement plan was based on my IRA, Social Security and part-time work to cover household expenses.

So now I have a smaller retirement income from my IRA, talk of entitlement cuts, increased sales taxes, higher gas prices, the potential for Prop. 13 to be repealed and the uncertainty of Obamacare's consequences. How can anyone make long-term financial plans with all this working against them? It reminds me of the saying: We're from the government and we're here to help. This irony is not lost on me.

Dan Buckner

San Juan Capistrano

Such a rosy future

The Federal Reserve has required the nation's biggest banks to undergo “stress tests” to show how they would handle recessions in Europe (now happening) and Japan (which has had a stagnant economy since the late 1980s) and a global recession.

Under the Fed's most severe scenario, the U.S. would undergo a recession in which unemployment would reach nearly 12 percent, stocks would lose half their value and home prices would plunge 20 percent. Now why might the Fed be doing that when we have such a rosy future ahead of us now that Obama has been re-elected?

Burl Estes

Mission Viejo

The GOP dark ages

Fifty years in perspective:

In 1952, President Eisenhower was elected facing a national debt greater than 100 percent of gross domestic product and high employment. Using the mantra, “A rising tide lifts all boats,” he started the Interstate Highway program to put people to work. He promoted private investment in jobs by having a tax structure that had its top rate at 91 percent. The super rich had two choices: invest or give it to government. They got richer while building the middle class.

In 1980, President Ronald Reagan faced a national debt that was less than 20 percent of the gross domestic product. Using the “trickle-down” mantra he cut taxes on the rich to 29 percent and then raised taxes on the middle class 17 times. Over the next 32 years, his policies have proven that “trickle down” grounds most boats in the mud.

The Dark Ages in history was a time when there was no middle class. Today's GOP policies, evidenced in the Ryan budget, will continue our descent toward a “Dark Ages” economy with economic slavery for the masses.

Larry Severson

Fountain Valley

Budgets on the edge

I know that many on the Left believe that all businesses have some secret room somewhere filled with gold and jewels, but this isn't really the case. They have income and expenses just like you and I do. The only difference is that the numbers they work with are a little larger than the numbers we work with.

If a company has “x” amount of dollars in the budget for business obligations like paying salaries and the government suddenly increases their taxes to pay for a feel-good program like “Obamacare,” this leaves less money to pay their employees.

This means that some people will lose their jobs. In other cases, companies that are barely getting by will be driven out of business by higher taxes. More money spent on taxes means less money for salaries and benefits, it's really that simple.

Breck Rowell

Placentia

Too easy to raise taxes

Just days after the election and the passing of Proposition 30, raising the sales tax one-quarter cent and income tax rate for some, a legislator has proposed tripling the car registration fee, and the L.A. mayor says we must overturn or modify Proposition 13.

I don't mind the quarter-cent so much. But I do mind the constant attempts to raise taxes, without any attempt to rid this state of the redundancy of agencies and commissions.

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